Photographing language science (and language evolution)

Language scientists in Nijmegen have been showing off their artistic side, capturing their research in photography. Head over to Taal in Beeld for a look at the entries – some of them are really stunning.

When looking at the image, it’s tempting to try and find some correlations that look significant and imagine a causal story. However, the text on the screen (taken from artist Nathan Coley’s work “There will be no miracles here“) reminds us that, while we’d like to believe that anyone could make a chance discovery that explains how language works, we must remain rational and keep in mind the bigger picture.

Like this:

When reading that sentence I automatically interpreted “which shows how every linguistic variable in WALS correlates with every other variable” as *significantly* correlating…what a feat, Sean! I’m still suspecting you only put that graph out in order to obliterate your massive reporting bias.